Return to my Nest

                                 Miranda Meets the Gnomes 

                                                 by Kaylee and Megan 
                                                 March 16th and 17th, 2000


Long, long ago, far far away, in the land of Guden, in the kingdom of Buckbeat, 
there was an evil king and evil queen who had only one child: a daughter, two year 
old Miranda, who was pretty and kind and very clever.  

Princess Miranda lived in a big medieval castle with her evil parents. It had ugly 
gray walls and a moat filled with mean, nasty alligators. All around the castle was 
a vast and beautiful forest, which had been named after Miranda's kind grandmother 
Aleesha. 

One day, Miranda ventured out of the castle. She wandered because she had 
no other children to play with, so she was very lonely. She had heard the servants 
talking about a lake with dolphins that was only two miles away, so Miranda had 
decided to go and see if she could make some friends there. (Miranda was 
only a little girl, and did not know how far two miles was. There was no road 
or path to the lake, only a sign with an arrow. So Miranda went the way the arrow 
pointed, through the woods. 

There were many trees; green and tall and proud trees. Miranda had never been 
in the forest before, and she decided that she liked it. 

She hadn't walked very far when she suddenly saw something very strange. Shoes! 
Miranda had seen shoes before, but never shoes like these. These shoes had wings.

These shoes were flying through the air!

Miranda, like any two year old would do, screamed. 

The shoes, surprised at the noise, stuck their tongues out and went, "pbpbpbpbpbtt!!"

Miranda, deciding to be brave again, did the same. "Pbpbpbpbpbtt!" 
Then she heard laughter, teeny tiny happy laughter. And Miranda looked down. 

What did Miranda see?

Teeny tiny happy people. 

"Hello!" They all said at once. Then the one with a white beard added, "We are 
gnomes. What are you?" 

"I'm Miranda, princess of the kingdom of Buckbeat. I'm looking for a friend. 
Will you be my friends?"

"Yes!" They all said at once, jumping around and dancing. "My name is Moss," the 
little white-bearded gnome said. "This is my wife Cloudy, and my children: Louge, 
Baby, Scruffy, and Rocky. We're glad you see us. Most humans don't see us, they 
just walk by and never look down. They - they are mean."

Miranda asked Moss, "how are the grownups mean?"

Cloudy looked sad. "The servants of the evil King George the Third come into the 
forest and chop down the trees! We live in the holes made by the tree's roots. When 
the trees are cut down, we lose our homes!" 

"It's terrible," the boy gnome named Louge said. "They don't even make nice 
things like tables and toys! The evil Queen Pricilla makes them put the trees into 
piles and burn them! It's very wasteful and mean." 

"We don't like losing our homes, a girl gnome added sadly. 

Her younger brother patted her on her teeny tiny shoulder. "It'll be ok, Scruffy. 
When we get to the lake, we can ask the dolphins to think up a way to stop the 
evil king and queen."

"But it's a very long way, and we are so little, our legs can't walk very fast."

"Yes," Moss said to Miranda. "We are afraid that by the time we get to the lake, 
our homes will be long gone. Chopped and burned."

Miranda was almost going to cry. "That's so sad. I want to help, but I am only 
two years old. What could I ever do?"

Miranda sat down on a soft patch of grass to think. What could she do to help? 
She didn't know. Sighing, she looked up at the trees that would soon be cut down 
and burned. Then she saw it. The answer!

The flying shoes!

"The shoes!" She yelled out in joy, "we can fill the flying shoes with water 
from the lake and they can carry the water to the fires and dump it to stop the 
fires from burning any more trees!"

"That sounds like a great idea," all the gnomes shouted at once. "We'll do it!" 

"But we still can't get to the lake in time," Cloudy said sadly. "We were already 
walking as fast as we could!" She looked up at the winged shoes flying over 
their heads, and she sighed. 

One of the shoes held still in the air, hovering. Then, it suddenly swung 
down and scooped up a very surprised cloudy into it's middle.

"AAAAA!" She screamed.

"Wait!" Miranda cried out, hushing the terrified little she-gnome. "See? All of 
you can ride in the shoes, and get to the lake for water faster!" 

"Hurray!" All the gnomes shouted happily, jumping around and dancing. More shoes 
swooped down and picked up the rest of the gnomes, and two flying shoes 
cooperated to slide Princess Miranda's feet inside them, and gently scooped 
her up into the air. 

"Whoa! I can't balance in the air! I'm only two years old!"

So two more shoes flew in and hovered next to her, one on each side. Miranda reached 
her hands out and held onto them.

Very quickly they flew, as a group high over the trees green and tall and proud. 
Within minutes, they were landing on the gravelly shore of a very pretty little 
lake. Out of the water popped two funny-shaped, smiling heads.

The heads opened their smiling mouths and squeaked, "Hello! Who are you? We didn't 
know that little human girls were friends with even-littler gnome families. I 
am called Bubbles. This is my friend, Seahorse." 

"Oh!" Miranda squealed with glee, "there's just so many wonderful friends 
today!" 

The gnomes quickly told the dolphins their sad story, and asked if it would be 
all right with the dolphins to use some of the water from their lake.

"Certainly," the dolphins replied. And they helped by squirting water into the 
shoes, filling them faster, except the shoes that were full of gnome or princess. 
Then all she shoes, every one of them, flew off towards the castle and the evil 
bonfires. 

The flying shoes dumped out their cargo of water onto the bonfires, putting 
them out so that they no longer burned. Then the shoes, getting a great idea, flew 
down and KICKED all the mean servants as hard as they could. The servants were so 
surprised, and scared, that they screamed and ran away, right out of the kingdom 
of Buckbeat and the land of Guden. 

Since the evil king and queen no longer had anyone to boss around, well, they 
were no longer able to do mean things. When they did try, the flying shoes 
kicked their royal bottoms until they behaved.

So Princess Miranda lived happily ever after, and visited her little friends 
the gnomes in their homes every afternoon for tea and cookies. 

                                         The End.